These games are the bottom of a can of soda your buddy just handed back to you after taking way too big of a sip, so that the can is 90% empty and you start thinking about what percentage of what’s left is backwash, and then … ehh, come to think of it you’re not really that thirsty.
Cans like that start off perfectly pleasantly — a sweet fizzy drink on a hot day — and so it was with Monday night’s game against the Rangers. Tylor Megill pitched well, then bent instead of breaking the third time through the enemy order when some of the steam came off his pitches. Rafael Ortega played some good defense in left, Brandon Nimmo and DJ Stewart went deep — it was refreshing.
But then came the ninth, and Trevor Gott being asked to secure a one-run lead, and it was time to give what was left in the can a suspicious shake.
I’ve written about changing my tune on Ortega and Stewart and even Jonathan Arauz, though I do kind of wish Arauz could hit. But Gott I’ve had no use for, and Monday night’s game didn’t exactly change my mind. Gott gave up a single and a double within five pitches, leaving the fall-behind run a single hit away before recording an out — and sending me to Twitter to grouse at everyone and no one. (I’ve mostly quit Twitter — oh, sorry, I forgot that jackass renamed it X — for Bluesky, but Bluesky is still sparsely populated and mostly nice, meaning it’s a poor fit when you need to vent your spleen.) Having dug himself a hole, Gott then fanned Leody Taveras and Marcus Semien, making me wonder if I’d have to issue a mea culpa after he Houdini’d his way out of trouble. Which, let me make it abundantly clear, would have been fine — one of many marvelous things about baseball is how often you’re happy to be wrong.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t wrong. The Mets gave Corey Seager a free pass to first, which was only sensible. But then Gott missed badly with a 1-1 sinker to Nathaniel Lowe, forcing him to give Lowe something to hit. Against the Cardinals in a similar spot Gott made a perfect pitch to Paul Goldschmidt. He didn’t make one to Lowe — he left a cutter elevated which Lowe whacked between first and second, almost but not quite clipping Seager on its way to the outfield grass. The Rangers led 4-3 and won by that score after dealing with a bit of Met kicking and bleating in the bottom of the ninth, and we were done.
Honestly, my only question at this point is how the hell Gott managed to retire Goldschmidt.
Alvarez taking a walk was a welcome sign. A baby Met doing anything positive is what we have to look forward to now. I think it was a pitch-around since a slumping Alvarez is still a bigger home threat than Narvaez. But Alvarez could have made himself out with bad swings and didn’t.
I wanted to enjoy the Mets playing spoiler against Scherzer’s Rangers who were slumping, maybe even knock them out of a wildcard berth. Looks like the Mets may help the Rangers get right instead.
* bigger home run threat, not “bigger home threat”.
Of all the ways the Mets have managed to lose games this year, curiously the Ninth Inning Blown One Run Save has not often been one of them. And it’s what we feared most going into the season. Baseball…
Excellent point.
But the absence of Diaz still had a negative effect on the mentality of the team, leading to many losses.
More than the mentality. It was a domino effect. The combination of Diaz’s injury pulling Robertson into the closer role and the rest of the bullpen into higher leverage roles than they were meant for, plus chronic 3-4 or even fewer inning starts, when even 5 or 6 inning starts were really too short, stretched open, constantly exposed, and overworked the underbelly of the Mets’ middle relief. So while Robertson admirably subbed for Diaz, the Mets lost a lot of games with the starters and middle relievers before the games reached Robertson.
A tribute video for a mercenary who was here for a year and a half and accomplished none of the things for which he was hired.
LOLMets, indeed.
Nothing like a good bullpen meltdown at the end of a long day. But as usual, a few more runs would have helped.